Lou's musings

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Hey, you! Yeah, you! Check out my first post.

This post is the beginning of my musings, a place where I can share my ideas, photos (check out my Facebook Page: Completely Candid Photography to see more) and views. I don’t have a load of writing experience, but here goes.

This first post is about the importance of kindness. Kindness plays such a huge role in our lives. It’s actually unbelievable how by just holding a door open for someone, you can make someone’s day. You may be reading this and having a bit of a giggle. You might be thinking: Lou, what real effect will this have on someone’s day?

Now, let me just elaborate a little further. As a society, we are all absorbed in our phones or laptops. Just thinking about this now, I am on my phone all the time, in between journeys, when I get home and even I fall victim to going on my phone when with my friends. Does that make me an unkind human being? No. It’s about taking ourselves away from technology and doing something for other people.

Back to holding the door open for someone, let me set the scene for you. There is a young man, early 30’s, well dressed, attractive, looks like he has a good job, it looks like everything is going well for him. Let me just emphasise the word ‘looks’ here. Someone’s appearance presents only a small percentage of what they feel like on the outside. What you don’t know about this man, is that his girlfriend just left him for another man, he is heartbroken and has lost hope in the world and for the future. Everything seems to be going wrong for him. You walk into a café and spot this man walking in behind you, you give him a smile, hold the door open for him and carry on with your day. You might not believe it, but you have just made that man’s day.

You might be thinking, how on earth can opening the door really make this man feel better about himself? And I agree. I really do. I am not saying that this will solve his possible depression or feelings of hopelessness, but to know that some stranger was kind enough to take a minute out of their day to offer an act of kindness to him, offers a glimmer of hope, just a small moment where his thoughts aren’t preoccupied by negative, intrusive thoughts.

I just wanted to provide a real life example of this, that you all might have heard of. It’s the story of a man who was experiencing great despair and suicidal thoughts. This man was on Waterloo Bridge in London, considering taking his life and a great Samaritan walked past and spoke to him for hours, telling him things would get better. He managed to get this man to have a coffee with him and just talk to him. After getting therapy and recovering, there was a huge campaign over social media to find this guy who saved his life. They are friends now still and ran the marathon together this year. This is such proof that one act of kindness can literally save someone’s life.

I just wanted to finish this post, with a picture I took in Tel Aviv, last summer and hit you with some thoughts below, which I had back at the time.

Sometimes things aren’t obvious in life. You spend so much time going from A to B, this to that and you don’t see the bigger picture. With photography, you are able to use such a beautiful piece of equipment to produce a simple photo like this. All there is in this picture is a bunch of pomegranates, but by playing with the aperture, you are able to capture the best one, the juiciest let’s say. This juicy pomegranate is a metaphor of the best things in life. It’s a reminder to see the best in every situation. Life is difficult for all of us in different ways and sometimes it isn’t so easy to find that juicy pomegranate of our situation. But taking those steps to start appreciating life and offering that little bit of kindness to others, can help you to see the bigger and happier picture, so to change your outlook on life and even other people’s.